Mitigating against pipeline surface damage during construction project.

Quality control from factory

Transportation from yard.

Pipe end protection.

Equipment use.

Support during stringing and welding

Lowering in

Backfilling using screeners

Steel transmission pipelines going through mountain areas often face significant risks
during their construction and service life. One of the biggest challenges is to protect the
pipe and its external coatings against mechanical damage from impact and penetration.

When installing and operating transmission pipelines in mountain regions, one has to account
for specific risks in order to mitigate potential lost time, increased costs, and accidents with
human and economic costs.

Climate is an important consideration during both pipeline construction and operation in

mountain areas. Some seasons can be harsh, with heavy snowfall or rain, and extreme
temperatures and winds, restricting the access to the right-of-way (RoW) during construction.
In addition, weather patterns are usually rapidly changing – quick temperature changes and
flash rains – which can delay the construction of the pipelines. During pipeline operation,
pipelines in permafrost regions face stability issues.

Geography is another significant risk factor with two sub-categories – topography and
geology. Mountain areas can have a challenging topography such as steep slopes, river and
lake crossings. Geology can also raise issues during both construction and operation, with
companies faced with hard rock, wet or frozen ground conditions, earthquake and fault
zones, erosion and landslides, karst and sinkholes.

Mountains often include environmentally sensitive and protected areas, such as national
parks. Pipeline projects have to be designed, installed and operated with a minimum footprint
on flora and fauna, usually translated in reduced RoW and temporary workspace. Minimising
any risk of accidental harmful discharge or contamination is also important.
Article continues below…

Supplying some of the required materials such as sand for padding, and safely disposing of
surplus materials can be difficult during the construction phase of a mountain pipeline.

Finally, building and operating pipelines in mountain regions can be dangerous for the people
involved. Clear safety standards and operating procedures have to be in place to avoid
accidents.

In order to address the above-mentioned risk factors, the pipeline industry is dedicating a lot
of effort to prepare and standardise the construction and operation of pipelines in mountain
regions.

The International Pipeline and Offshore Contractors Association (IPLOCA) presents ten
different pipeline construction environments in its recently released recommended
construction practices for onshore pipelines, Onshore Pipelines: The Road to Success. Three
of these environments directly describe mountain areas – the side slope, ridge and rock RoW
scenarios. Another two refer to arctic conditions and the environmentally sensitive area often
encountered in mountain terrain. In all the scenarios, one of the most efficient ways of
mitigating the pipeline construction and operating risks is to protect the steel pipe against
mechanical damage from impact and penetration.

The need for supplementary mechanical protection

Mechanical damage to the pipe can occur during all phases of the pipeline construction and
operation, for example during transportation, handling (loading in and out), storage,
lowering-in, backfilling, and during pipeline’s service life. Impacts and penetration damage
can be caused by many factors:

* Other pipes or pipe handling equipment; * Lowering-in; and, * Rocks in the trench bottom
or impact from the backfill material.

Steel pipe is impact resistant by itself and some of the external coatings applied on steel
increase this basic mechanical protection. However, in order to ensure an incident-free service
life for the pipeline, the steel pipe and the anti-corrosion coating have to be intact during
construction and operation. This cannot be guaranteed by the basic mechanical protection of
the steel and anti-corrosion coatings. Therefore, the industry has developed supplementary
mechanical protection systems that are aimed at reducing or eliminating the risk of
mechanical damage.
As the industry uses a wide range of supplementary mechanical protection systems, this
article will focus on the systems that protect the entire diameter and length of the pipe, and
which are the most efficient in protecting the pipe and its coating against impact and
penetration. Today, most pipeline projects use the following supplementary mechanical
protection system: concrete coatings, sand padding and select backfill (mechanical padding),
as well as non-woven geotextiles and rockshield materials.

Mechanical protection systems

Concrete coatings for mechanical protection have been developed during the last 25–30 years
in North America, Australia and Europe, and are usually applied in specialised coating
facilities.

Steel wire mesh reinforced concrete coatings that are usually 20–25 mm thick and fibre-
reinforced concrete coatings (8–10 mm thick) are the two types of mechanical protection
concrete coatings. Wire-mesh concrete coatings are applied using a side-wrap process, while
the fibre-reinforced concrete coatings are applied using a spraying process, without any
damage to the pipe and the pipe coating during application.

The concrete coatings offer excellent damage resistance – minimum impact resistance of 150
J for the fibre-reinforced concrete coatings and 450 J for the wire-reinforced concrete
coatings. The mechanical protection concrete coatings are fully bendable according to the
industry standards; do not need additional equipment or manpower for installation; and, do
not have any usage limitations in terms of terrain configuration, ground conditions or climate.
Concrete coatings are currently the only supplementary mechanical protection systems that
protect steel pipe through all the construction and service life phases – from transportation,
handling and storage to lowering-in, backfilling and long-term service life.

Sand bedding and padding is still the most frequently used supplementary mechanical
protection system. Sand is usually supplied to the RoW, where it is used in the trench to
protect the pipe against impact and penetration from rocky outcrops in the trench bottom or
impacts from rocks in the excavated trench material. The sand layer usually has a thickness of
20–30 cm around the pipe and has a minimum impact resistance of 300–450 J. Sand padding
needs additional equipment such as sand trucks, padding machines, temporary work and
storage space at the RoW, as well as additional manpower and materials. Additional costs are
usually incurred for the transportation and disposal of the original trench material that
becomes surplus material after the use of sand. This system protects the pipe during the
pipeline backfilling and operation phases, and industry experience shows that potential sand
washouts can reduce long-term protection.
Sand padding also has limitations in terms of terrain configurations, such as steep slopes,
climate, and wet or frozen sand. More recently, select backfilling (or mechanical padding) has
been used as a sand padding technique. This requires special equipment that can screen the
material excavated from the trench and install the finer grades around the pipe, while using
the coarser material for closing up the trench. This system has terrain configuration, soil type
(clay, silt) and climate limitations that are similar to sand padding, but has the advantage of
re-using the trench material and thus avoiding most surplus material disposal costs.

Non-woven geotextile materials are polypropylene fibre-based rolls, and rockshield materials
are polyethylene or PVC-based solid sheets or open-cell rolls that are installed around the
steel pipe in the field, usually before the lowering-in phase. These materials are available in
different styles and thicknesses, with the usual thickness per layer at 4–14 mm for non-woven
geotextiles and 6–11 mm for rockshield materials.

These materials also have a wide range of technical performance. As an example, their
minimum impact resistance is in the 25–35 J range. These materials protect the pipe during
lowering-in, backfilling and the pipeline service life. The installation of these materials is very
slow, taking approximately 15 minutes for a team of three people to protect just one pipe
joint, and the quality of the protection is highly dependent on the skills of the field installation
team.

The impact resistance of these materials is limited. When rocks more than 10 cm in size are
present in the backfill material, other protection systems such as sand padding have to be
added, which further increases the total protection cost. Industry sources, such as a recent
Interstate Natural Gas Association of America (INGAA) report entitled Emerging Bedding,
Padding, and Related Pipeline Construction Practices, also mention concerns regarding the
negative impacts of some of these materials – the solid sheet type – on the active anti-
corrosion protection of the pipeline.

Conclusion

Building and operating pipelines in mountain areas is a challenging endeavor that can be
facilitated by properly protecting the steel pipe and its anti-corrosion coating with
supplementary mechanical protection systems.

The optimum supplementary mechanical protection system will be selected based on a well
defined series of technical performance, design and constructability, environmental impact
and economical criteria. The pipeline industry is using its field experience to improve the
existing systems and to develop new ones. The above-mentioned INGAA study has identified
two main areas as the focus for future innovations in mechanical protection systems –
coatings that are resistant to damage, and new crushing/padding equipment.